He recalled that shortly after September 11, 2001, when he first saw photographs identifying Mohammed Atta as one of the terrorists, he recognized him. Mr. XXXXXX testified, ‘Yeah and I'm looking and I said, Jesus, I recognized his picture instantly. . . . Yeah, I went to my chart to compare and I said there he is.’That's just one of many such identifications. Yet the DOD, using techniques that would have embarrassed even the Warren Commission, has concluded that all such witnesses are lying. For what earthly reason?
Monday, October 23, 2006
Able Danger "debunked"
Xymphora has a must-read analysis of the DOD's report debunking the claims that the Able Danger "data mining" effort had targeted the 911 hijackers -- secifically Mohammed Atta -- before the event. I can quibble with X on a few points, but his basic stance is quite sound. One of the witnesses (names redacted by the report writers) to the infamous chart thus recalls the image of Mohammed Atta:
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2 comments:
I spent a lot of time at one point trying to sort out the claims involved in Able Danger and could never make them add up in any way that seemed plausible.
For example, none of the people involved seemed to agree on when the chart was created (late 1999? early 2000? summer 2000?), or on when and on whose orders the files were destroyed.
Weldon has stated that he gave away his only copy of the chart on September 25, 2001, but he displayed what sounds like the same chart to Congress the next May, during a speech titled "DEFENDING PRESIDENT BUSH REGARDING KNOWLEDGE OF SEPTEMBER 11, 2001."
I did not find out about this until October of 2001, after the attack on the trade center. A year before, special forces command developed their own mini version of a data processing or collaborative center with very limited capabilities. But what they did, Mr. Speaker, they did a profile of al Qaeda 1 year before 9-11.
Mr. Speaker, here is the chart, the unclassified chart of what special forces command had 1 year before 9-11. Interesting. The entire al Qaeda network is identified in a graphic chart with all the linkages to all the terrorist groups around the world.
Note that here Weldon states he did not even find out about the chart until October 2001, a month after he supposedly handed over his copy.
Xymph tries to get around some of the problems by suggesting that the Atta on the Able Danger chart was a different Atta from the one the CIA was surveilling in Germany in 2002. But in that case, which of them was the Atta whose doings in Florida have been obsessively scrutinized by Daniel Hopsicker?
Usually, when suppressed information comes out, the effect is to make clear certain things that have previously been murky. The Able Danger story just adds several new levels of murk. That may be the major reason why I have real problems with it.
Sorry, that should read, "surveilling in Germany in 2000."
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